


Pride

by LeeLeeMak



Series: Cahills Assemble! [4]
Category: The 39 Clues - Various Authors
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, F/M, Major Character Injury, Marvelverse!Cahills
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-16
Updated: 2014-01-16
Packaged: 2018-01-08 21:53:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1137813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeeLeeMak/pseuds/LeeLeeMak
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She is determined, this time, to beat him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pride

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ztannas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ztannas/gifts).



She is determined, this time, to beat him.

So far, no one has been able to beat Ian in any sort of training sesson, not even Jake or Atticus who had both been specially trained and modified to be specifically good and unbeatable at this sort of thing. At first, everyone had seen it as a challenge -- _I’ll_ be the one to beat him -- but soon it became aware that the only person probably capable of beating Ian was Natalie, and he didn’t let her fight at all.

Of course, the secret to his success was that he cheated. He didn’t land a single hit, didn’t even try, until his opponent was out of breath and nearly on the floor. Even Sinead, with her magic, was no match against the defensive side of Ian Kabra. He was simply too swift to hit. Dan had been able to slow him down once, but that was once. Ian carried around a lighter whenever he fought Dan, after that incident.

She’d challenged him many times before, friendly spars up until -- honestly, up until Jake had come along -- and had been fine with losing every time. She learned from her mistakes, after all and that was the point of the spars. When Jake came, the first fight was just like the others. He wore her out then took her down with two or three hits -- five, at the most -- but losing was different this time. Ian still helped her up, offered to guide her to a chair and get her a drink, but Jake was there. And he seemed... disappointed. He pouted at her, just a bit, before furrowing his brow and leaving. She didn’t accept Ian’s offers, though she normally did.

She has had three matches with Ian since that, and she is certain this fourth one will finally be the time Ian loses. She has a secret weapon this time, after all.

She’d met with his father -- the original Ironman -- and had a nice, long talk with him.

Ian stood at the other side of the ring, stretching his muscles out and overall looking like his gorgeous self. The arc reactor in his chest glowed a soft blue, just as it always did.

Natalie, Dan, Jake, Hamilton, and Cécile (the newest addition to the team) stood around the ring. Dan and Cécile were taking bets, though on who Amy couldn’t tell. She imagined Ian, not even her brother had faith in her. The others were watching tentatively, either Amy and Ian or the television screen -- Evan and Elizabeth were making some kind of Ant-Man/Wasp team in England right now, fighting some kind of “red peril”, and everyone was biting their nails in anticipation of the news.

She waits for Ian to be ready -- the cocky bastard hasn’t been preparing all night and morning like she has -- and then for Dan to call go.

She does her usually routine for a while, one Ian helped her create and one she’s never used against him. He seems confused, which is exactly what she wants. While he’s busy dodging and dashing and wondering what the hell she’s doing, he’s totally distracted from what she’s actually doing.

She’s conserving her energy, just enough that Ian shouldn’t notice. It was one of the “powers” she gained from her parents -- Dan can shoot webs and climb walls and be a spider, Amy can fight better than the average human. Energy conservation was new to her, just recently discovered with Sinead, but she supposed it fit in the “fight better than the average human”. She’d been testing it recently, but it wasn’t her secret weapon.

She twisted and turned him into poses that would benefit her, just visualizing things and trying to find her best angle to utilize her secret weapon.

It wasn’t a weapon so much as knowledge -- she’d talked to Vikram under the premise that Amy was worried about his arc reactor. Vikram had told her all about it, even offered to come and check it out just in case. She assured him that he was fine -- and he was, Amy really had no need to be worried, and truly she wasn’t in the first place -- but she was certain Vikram was keeping watch anyway. He was probably suspicious when Ian showed perfect health, but that didn’t matter.

All that matter was that Amy was going to finally beat him.

She determined quickly the perfect angle to reach his chest without him being able to counteract -- the spar had gone on for about three minutes now -- and got into place.

She ducked under him as he lurched forward, just as he was supposed to. She reached up and grabbed his arc reactor under his shirt, the very thin edges that just barely rose above his skin. Ian realized too late what she was doing, and cried out in vain as she pushed and twisted the contraption. It fell right into her hand -- with Ian following it.

She pushed him off of her, the arc reactor still in her hand. Before she could proclaim her victory, Natalie screeched. Suddenly, Amy was on the floor with a surprisingly massive weight on her back, wrestling her for Ian’s arc reactor. Amy relinquished it with little resistance, figuring her fight was won.

She stood up and turned to Jake, smiling at him. But instead of being met with a smile from him, she was met with a fist from Cécile.

“What the hell do you think you are doing?” She screamed. While her head was still swimming, Cécile grabbed her hair and forced her to look at Ian.

Natalie had turned him on to his back and was doing something with the arc reactor -- putting it back in? -- the only thing was that Ian didn’t look like himself. He was pale and pained, his eyes glassy and wide and his mouth gaped, like he was dying.

“Hamilton!” Natalie cried. “Hamilton, what do I do?”

Hamilton launched himself into the ring and slid over to Ian. What was going on?

Cécile shook her head. “That was his heart you just pulled out of his chest!”

It hit Amy like a bucket of cold water. She’d always thought it was just something that further connected him to his suit, that’s what he always said it was! He’d never told her, or anyone, that it was his _heart_.

Why hadn’t Vikram mentioned something?

“H-how?” She stammered.

Cécile let go of her, she was now cursing Ian in French, she must have realized that Amy hadn’t known.

Someone -- Jake -- put their arms around Amy’s shoulders. “It’s alright,” he said. She hadn’t realized she was crying. “You hadn’t known. I don’t think anyone but them did.”

Ian was in the hospital for a few days, per Evan. Ian complained about how much of a worry-wort he was, but even though he was an ocean away, Evan wasn’t going to let his best friend work himself to death after having his heart torn out.

Natalie and Hamilton and Evan (once he got back with Elizabeth, who was not in the least bit pleased with Amy) explained Ian’s situation to the others. Sinead insisted she experiment with it, to which pretty much everyone denied.

Amy tried to apologize a number of times, but Ian always ignored her. She understood that he was a man of immense pride, but even this was above his usual snotty self. Even Jake, who did not take accidental death (or any death, since he’d nearly died himself) lightly, seemed to think Ian overstepped his boundaries.

“Look, I’m not saying I’m better than him,” he’d said over frozen yogurt. “But I’d have long forgiven you. And maybe have taken you out to a movie.”

Amy laughed. “Which movie?”

He shrugged. “Some documentary. That’s what you like, yeah?”

She just shook her head and rubbed his leg with her foot. He seemed largely flustered by this, judging by the blush on his face this wasn’t common forty or seventy or however many years ago. She liked to make him blush with modern “courting rituals”.

On a mission about two days later, Ian finally spoke to her.

“I’ll forgive you if you agree to another match.”

What was with her and prideful men?

She agreed, of course.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday, sweet Eri!


End file.
